The rantings of a teacher who retired from the classroom but not from education.

Thursday, January 17, 2013

No Fun Anymore

Teaching used to be a fun job. In fact, many of us loved what we did so much we didn't even consider it a job. We cared about them, and taught them. Test scores were the last things on every one's mind when we stood in front of the classroom. And, while test scores did not matter, our student's educations did. Not only did we do our best to make our lessons engaging and easy to understand, we spent hours outside of the classroom working with students. We didn't think about VAM. We did it out of love for our students.

Today's teachers can't think about having fun in the classroom. They can't deviate from the script. Their only goal is test prep. I walked past the first school I ever taught in today and remembered the days, once a month, where the entire school went to a nearby gym to play, get to know each other and to learn things you can't learn in a book.

I'm glad I am not a young person going into teaching today. I am sure I would not survive.

(Education today goes so well with the things I saw at Houston Funeral Museum. Above is a photo of an very early hearse.)

6 comments:

I remember actually enjoying teaching those kids who failed the regents -- they were, for the most part, very very eager to get it right the second or third time and very receptive. I actually requested those classes (in addition to the other extreme, the AP and Honors kids). Today, only a fool would want to teach those classes since their scores would determine whether you keep your job or not! I too loved, loved, loved teaching until everything started to fall apart about 6 years ago when the tyrant started closing schools, hiring non- educators as principals, used the network system to rob funds and control from the schools, and established the "gotcha" atmosphere that truly makes education one of the worst fields for a young person to enter today.

Im still in the system 27 years now. I'm hanging in until my last child is finished college. I too remember when teaching was fun (and I worked some tough H.S. in the Bronx!) I feel very sorry for the young teachers today. I survive and thrive today because, like many veteran teachers, I was taught excellant classroom management skils by some wonderful AP's. Many of us 'old-timers' can still teacher all comers even when admin loads our classes with the toughest kids! One newbie teacher recently told me she wants to emulate the Zen-like atmosphere of my classes:)It's kinda nice to still rock the class after all these years even though the system considers us too old and expensive.